Farther down the coast is the ancient "limb" of Dover, which has grown into the rival port of Folkestone. This modern port, created to aid the necessities of travel across the Channel, stands at the north-eastern corner of the Romney Marsh, a district that has been raised out of the sea and is steadily increasing in front of the older coast-line, shown by a range of hills stretching westward from Folkestone. This marsh has made the sea retreat fully three miles from Hythe, whose name signifies "the harbor," though it is now an inland village, with a big church dedicated to St. Leonard, the deliverer of captives, who was always much reverenced in the Cinque Ports, their warlike sailors being frequently taken prisoner. In a crypt under its chancel is a large collection of skulls and bones, many of them bearing weapon scars and cuts, showing them to be relics of the wars. Beyond Hythe the Rother originally flowed into the Channel, but a great storm in the reign of Edward I. silted up its outlet, and the river changed its course over towards Rye, so as to avoid the Cinque port of Romney that was established on the western edge of the marshes to which it gave the name. Romney is now simply a village without any harbor, and of the five churches it formerly had, only the church of St. Nicholas remains as a landmark among the fens that have grown up around it, an almost treeless plain intersected by dykes and ditches.
RYE AND WINCHELSEA.
OLD HOUSES, RYE.
The unpicturesque coast is thrust out into the sea to the point at Dungeness where the lighthouse stands a beacon in a region full of peril to the navigator; and then the coast again recedes to the cove wherein is found the quaint old town of Rye, formerly an important "limb" of the Cinque port of Hastings. It has about the narrowest and crookedest streets in England, and the sea is two miles away from the line of steep and broken rock along which "Old Rye" stretches. The ancient houses, however, have a sort of harbor, formed by the junction of the three rivers, the Rother, Brede, and Tillingham, and thus Rye supports quite a fleet of fishing-craft. Thackeray has completely reproduced in Denis Duval the ancient character of this place, with its smuggling atmosphere varied with French touches given by the neighborhood of the Continent. Rye stands on one side of a marshy lowland, and Winchelsea about three miles distant on the other side. The original Winchelsea, we are told, was on lower ground, and, after frequent floodings, was finally destroyed by an inundation in 1287. King Edward I. founded the new town upon the hill above. It enjoyed a lucrative trade until the fifteenth century, when, like most of the others, its prosperity was blighted by the sea's retiring. The harbor then became useless, the inhabitants left, the houses gradually disappeared, and, the historian says, the more massive buildings remaining "have a strangely spectral character, like owls seen by daylight." Three old gates remain, including the Strand Gate, where King Edward nearly lost his life soon after the town was built. It appears that the horse on which he was riding, frightened by a windmill, leaped over the town-wall, and all gave up the king for dead. Luckily, however, he kept his saddle, and the horse, after slipping some distance down the incline, was checked, and Edward rode safely back through the gate. There is a fine church in Winchelsea—St. Thomas of Canterbury—within which are the tombs of Gervase Alard and his grandson Stephen. They were the most noted sailors of their time, and Gervase in 1300 was admiral of the fleet of the Cinque Ports, his grandson Stephen appearing as admiral in 1324. These were the earliest admirals known in England, the title, derived from the Arabic amir, having been imported from Sicily. Gervase was paid two shillings a day. At the house in Winchelsea called the "Friars" lived the noted highwaymen George and Joseph Weston, who during the last century plundered in all directions, and then atoned for it by the exercise of extensive charity in that town: one of them actually became a churchwarden.
HASTINGS AND PEVENSEY.
The cliffs come out to the edge of the sea at Winchelsea, and it is a pleasant walk along them to Hastings, with its ruined castle, the last of the Cinque Ports. This was never as important a port as the others, but the neighboring Sussex forests made it a convenient place for shipbuilding. The castle ruins are the only antiques at Hastings, which has been gradually transformed into a modern watering-place in a pretty situation. Its eastern end, however, has undergone little transition, and is still filled with the old-fashioned black-timber houses of the fishermen. The battle of Hastings, whereby William the Conqueror planted his standard on English soil, was fought about seven miles inland. His ships debarked their troops all along this coast, while St. Valéry harbor in France, from which he sailed, is visible in clear weather across the Channel. William himself landed at Pevensey, farther westward, where there is an old fortress of Roman origin located in the walls of the ancient British-Roman town that the heathen Saxons had long before attacked, massacring the entire population. Pevensey still presents within these walls the Norman castle of the Eagle Honour, named from the powerful house of Aquila once possessing it. The Bayeux Tapestry depicts the landing of William at Pevensey, which was a "limb" of Hastings. Its Roman name was Anderida, the walls enclosing an irregular oval, the castle within being a pentagon, with towers at the angles. Beyond it the Sussex coast juts out at the bold white chalk promontory of Beachy Head.
